I'm an Engineer but I've begun a love affair with the bird of prey. I'm a level 31 and have spent at least 20 bucks on bridge officers ect. I even bought a carrier for ten bucks. But I decided to try the stock Bird of Prey which you initially start with and MAN.... that's fun.

So here is my problem. I'm a relative Noob to STO. I have three character slots. Is it worth it to start a new TAC character to make the best use of the Bird of Prey or not? I've heard some say yes. Some say no. I certainly don't want to continue on this course if it's not the best direction. What do you guys think? What are the MAJOR differences. Are there any other Engineer officers who had a similar problem but decided to pursue their affair with the Bird of Prey anyways? I'm at a loss.

I don't mind spending the money to restart. But I need to know some of the pro's and con's to make that decision.

Only problem I can see is the Engineer specific abilities are about power management and survivability. The BoP has essentially the worst survivability in the KDF line up so 1 x 5 isn't going to be as much as 7 x 5. But the power management could be good when you want to unload a ton of energy weapons into someone and not tank your weapons power level.

Essentially, any captain can work well in any ship, and the BoP is the best ship for flexibility. If you like it, -go- with it. You're the boss, you're paying for it, have fun.

You may even find out you like it so much you make a Sci, Tac, and Engi all fly in a BoP. I've seen some swear by it to that extent.

I'm an Engineer but I've begun a love affair with the bird of prey. I'm a level 31 and have spent at least 20 bucks on bridge officers ect. I even bought a carrier for ten bucks. But I decided to try the stock Bird of Prey which you initially start with and MAN.... that's fun.

So here is my problem. I'm a relative Noob to STO. I have three character slots. Is it worth it to start a new TAC character to make the best use of the Bird of Prey or not? I've heard some say yes. Some say no. I certainly don't want to continue on this course if it's not the best direction. What do you guys think? What are the MAJOR differences. Are there any other Engineer officers who had a similar problem but decided to pursue their affair with the Bird of Prey anyways? I'm at a loss.

I don't mind spending the money to restart. But I need to know some of the pro's and con's to make that decision.

The following is from a thread where the Engineer had a few ranks under his belt and wasn't feeling as happy with his performance in his BOP. And really can you make it work? For PVE I'm sure you can it will just be a struggle compared to using ANY OTHER SHIP. Why beat yourself up when you don't have to?

I'm all about the BOP. Really I like them they are just a blast.

None of the strengths of an engineer compliment the strengths of the BOP.

None of the strengths of the BOP compliment the strengths of an engineer.

Exactly zero. I want you to have no doubt in your mind that choosing to use a BOP as an engineer is only slightly better than choosing a shuttle.

The BOP is designed to deal a great amount of damage in a short amount of time and then to vanish. No really that is the design. There is no question there. It was not designed to do anything that an engineer is good at doing.

Engineers have abilities that allow them to maximize multiple power settings simultaneously as well as resist drains to their power, and have one huge heal. These abilities are not needed by and are not well utilized by a BOP.

And you really can't make up for missing out on the huge damage buff that is Attack Pattern Alpha.

If your taking the sort of damage in a BOP that miracle worker could help with your missing something about the BOP.

Cruisers and science ships play better with engineers. Even an escort build can be a good choice as escorts are intended to be under fire for extended periods of time, and overall high power levels, drain resists, and miracle worker can be highly valued by ALL these ships. Not so much the BOP.

In fact an engineer in any of those ships will be able to put out a consistently higher level of damage over the course of any engagement due to the enhanced power levels and survivability. But they will never have the burst damage of a Tactical.

But what about using science powers........

The yummy science powers are also buffed by APA. There's not a lot of escaping it.

You could do it, but I don't feel that you would be any happier at end game then you are now.

EDIT: Dear readers, remember this is a copy paste from a response to an engineer who started out really happy, and became less happy as his performance was plummeting as he leveled. So don't feel the need to point out that the OP isn't saying he is unhappy. I know this.

Hey hey. Interesting thread. I run an klink engi myself, and actually originally created the to on with the sole purpose of running a bop that was semi unkillable while still providing good dps. Without thinking I ran the bop as I would an escort or raptor, unflinching and lacking the imagination to run anything other then tac boffs in the top uni slots. Low and behold I was still semi squish anyways and while I could match the dps of my engi raptor by using battle decloak at every opportunity to make up for the 4th console it was an effort and for what? When I could just run my raptor pump out nice dps and tank it up better. And so my poor bop was left to the way side......until recently!

Having re-thought the build and finally having the imagination needed for any bop build, I was able to build an engi bop that is frustratingly hard to kill, and can prove to be more effective team wise also then my engi raptor while tanking even better. Guys see bops hang around to long they lock cannons for what should be an easy kill right? Wrong, an engi bop can play a great distraction role by making escorts chase them all day long. The old saying of you can't kill an engi never comes to mind when you see a bop I mean cmon its just a bop, tractor him at the right time, easy kill see you again when you respawn buddy.
In this case an engi bop can lend it self to the same role as an engi escort or raptor with the added value of being able to out maneouver enemy escorts and keep consistent sustained damage wearing them down. As you will see below my engi raptor can also support the team by providing CC with scramble sensors when focused fired leaving attackers lost for a new target and having wasted alphas and subnucs.

Usual 4x Dhc of your favourite flavour fore and turrets rear, omega 2 piece Hg shield, or borg 3 piece with Hg shield is even more preferable, engi or not with little hull, bleed through will kill you,so the Borg hull heal and its brilliance will keep you going.

With BFI doffs. With this build I utilise cloak every time its up to briefly cloak and decloakly purely for the damage bonus. When things get hairy,and shields and hull low hitting EPS power transfer followed by SS scrambles enemy for secs losing agro and hitting BFI and He all together. Bfi,SS and eps have similar CD so popping all together ensures they can be utilized together when needed. If things get rougher, or caught of by an alpha or SNB , the old reliable RSP remains, with miracle worker and rsf to carry you through even further if needs be and by which time the EPS, Bfi,SS combo is probably off CD again. More likely then not you will not need miracle worker and rsf save for a serious lack of shield/ hull moment as etp3 every cycle is a huge heal as is.And well all else fails cloak and run.

The build works great as a carrot in front of a donkey, kill me if you can sort of thing drawing fire least the other team will be scrambled every minute and your target's ship worn down quicker then they might realise.

As with any engi build you will not out DPS a tac equiv in burst, but you can keep an enemy under pressure and wear them down with little they can do. Even well time tractors can be tanked long enough to get you of dodge without having to cut and run once free.

The build can lend itself to tac captains also as well but they will have to spend more time running to cloak when the heats on.

I've run the build my self in PVP particularly the last while to good effect and has served me well as a change from a more boring engi raptor build. Then again aren't all Bop builds! Play up to the strenghts of a Bop as a Swiss Army Knife of ships, without becoming Swiss Cheese